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	<https://y.st./>
	Copyright © 2017 Alex Yst <mailto:copyright@y.st>

	This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
	it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
	the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
	(at your option) any later version.

	This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
	but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
	MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
	GNU General Public License for more details.

	You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
	along with this program. If not, see <https://www.gnu.org./licenses/>.
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<!DOCTYPE html>
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
	<head>
		<base href="https://y.st./en/a/help.xhtml" />
		<title>Do you really want my help? &lt;https://y.st./en/a/help.xhtml&gt;</title>
		<link rel="icon" type="image/png" href="/link/CC_BY-SA_4.0/y.st./icon.png" />
		<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/link/basic.css" />
		<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/link/site-specific.css" />
		<script type="text/javascript" src="/script/javascript.js" />
		<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width" />
	</head>
	<body>
		<nav>
			<p>
				<a href="/en/">Home</a> |
				<a href="/en/a/about.xhtml">About</a> |
				<a href="/en/a/contact.xhtml">Contact</a> |
				<a href="/a/canary.txt">Canary</a> |
				<a href="/en/URI_research/"><abbr title="Uniform Resource Identifier">URI</abbr> research</a> |
				<a href="/en/opinion/">Opinions</a> |
				<a href="/en/coursework/">Coursework</a> |
				<a href="/en/law/">Law</a> |
				<a href="/en/a/links.xhtml">Links</a> |
				<a href="/en/a/help.xhtml.asc">{this page}.asc</a>
			</p>
			<hr/>
		</nav>
		<header>
			<h1>Do you really want my help?</h1>
			<p>Understanding what to expect from me</p>
		</header>
<p>
	Some people ask me for help, then complain that the help that I give them isn&apos;t the help that they wanted.
	If you want my help, keep these things in mind before asking, as I <strong>*will not*</strong> deviate for any reason.
	If the help that you want goes against what&apos;s listed below, you&apos;re better off asking someone else.
	Please remember: you&apos;re not paying me, you&apos;re asking me for a favor.
	I&apos;m volunteering to help you out; it&apos;s not my job to waste my time on things that I cannot take pride in.
</p>
<h2 id="XHTML">I write in <abbr title="Extensible Hypertext Markup Language">XHTML</abbr>, not <abbr title="Hypertext Markup Language">HTML</abbr></h2>
<p>
	Unless you specify otherwise, if you ask me for help in creating or fixing a Web page, I write in <abbr title="Extensible Hypertext Markup Language">XHTML</abbr> 5.1, as defined by the <abbr title="World Wide Web Consortium">W3C</abbr>.
	If you like, I can also write in other versions of <abbr title="Extensible Hypertext Markup Language">XHTML</abbr>, though I&apos;m a bit reluctant to write in <abbr title="Extensible Hypertext Markup Language">XHTML</abbr> 1.0 Transitional.
	I send all pages that I write or fix for you through the <abbr title="World Wide Web Consortium">W3C</abbr> validator to ensure quality code.
	Under <strong>*no circumstances*</strong> will I volunteer to write or fix a page for you that&apos;s written in <abbr title="Hypertext Markup Language">HTML</abbr>.
	To be more clear, I will not send you a written or corrected page in <abbr title="Hypertext Markup Language">HTML</abbr> format for <strong>*any*</strong> reason.
	Depending on the quality of your <abbr title="Hypertext Markup Language">HTML</abbr> markup and whether I&apos;m feeling a bit masochistic, I might clean up your <abbr title="Hypertext Markup Language">HTML</abbr> into valid <abbr title="Extensible Hypertext Markup Language">XHTML</abbr>.
	However, some people like that <abbr title="Hypertext Markup Language">HTML</abbr>5 allows the omission of many of the tags that they deem useless.
	<abbr title="Extensible Hypertext Markup Language">XHTML</abbr> does not have this, and requires that all important tags be actually included instead of just assumed.
	Don&apos;t complain to me that I added a bunch of tags that you didn&apos;t want when fixing your page for you.
	When fixing pages, I add a <strong>*bare minimum*</strong> of what&apos;s required to make the document valid in <abbr title="Extensible Hypertext Markup Language">XHTML</abbr>, so I did no more than what you should expect that I&apos;ll do every time.
</p>
<h2 id="free_software">I use and build free software</h2>
<p>
	I use free software.
	If the help that you require from me cannot be done with free software, I won&apos;t do it.
	If you want help with a project that won&apos;t be covered by a free license, ask someone else.
	I will not waste my time developing proprietary code.
	I will not transfer my copyrights to you, so you&apos;ll be bound by a copyleft license when using my code.
</p>
<p>
	Less directly related to my work, this also means that if you ask me to get in touch with you over Skype or some other nonfree communication software to discuss your needs or my completed efforts, I cannot and will not comply.
	Email is a good way to reach me, or if you need something more synchronous, <abbr title="Internet Relay Chat">IRC</abbr> or another protocol that&apos;s usable with free software.
</p>
		<hr/>
		<p>
			Copyright © 2017 Alex Yst;
			You may modify and/or redistribute this document under the terms of the <a rel="license" href="/license/gpl-3.0-standalone.xhtml"><abbr title="GNU&apos;s Not Unix">GNU</abbr> <abbr title="General Public License version Three or later">GPLv3+</abbr></a>.
			If for some reason you would prefer to modify and/or distribute this document under other free copyleft terms, please ask me via email.
			My address is in the source comments near the top of this document.
			This license also applies to embedded content such as images.
			For more information on that, see <a href="/en/a/licensing.xhtml">licensing</a>.
		</p>
		<p>
			<abbr title="World Wide Web Consortium">W3C</abbr> standards are important.
			This document conforms to the <a href="https://validator.w3.org./nu/?doc=https%3A%2F%2Fy.st.%2Fen%2Fa%2Fhelp.xhtml"><abbr title="Extensible Hypertext Markup Language">XHTML</abbr> 5.1</a> specification and uses style sheets that conform to the <a href="http://jigsaw.w3.org./css-validator/validator?uri=https%3A%2F%2Fy.st.%2Fen%2Fa%2Fhelp.xhtml"><abbr title="Cascading Style Sheets">CSS</abbr>3</a> specification.
		</p>
	</body>
</html>

